On the Path to Measuring Parkinson's Progression

Researchers from the School of CS are commencing a new study aimed at furthering the understanding of Parkinson’s disease, and consequently improving treatment. PD is a progressive degenerative disorder with initial movement symptoms followed by cognitive and emotional problems. The researchers plan to develop a mobile health device for day to day monitoring of Parkinson’s disease. This will provide a low-cost, unobtrusive, always-on solution, which can track the everyday behaviour of people with PD, and consequently the disease progression  and treatment outcomes. This will allow clinicians to understand if current treatments are effective in prolonging real-world functioning. 

Clinicians need accurate and comprehensive insights into patients’ symptoms in order to make decisions about best possible treatment options. However, at present clinicians can only get snapshot-like measures of a person’s level of motor, cognitive, or emotional functioning which does not relate directly to everyday function and quality of life. The main aim of this project is to pilot a more complete and continuous measure of the daily functioning of people with Parkinson’s disease. 

This study will be funded by the Medical Research Council and will use a cross-disciplinary and specialist combinatorial approach.